Undeterred by critics, Cabral forges on

Suffolk County Sheriff Andrea Cabral sat in a muggy classroom at Roxbury’s Boston Latin Academy, talking to a small group of twenty-somethings about crime and describing her concern about the startling rise in violent activity by women.

Suddenly Cabral, who at 6 foot 1 can look imposing, caught herself.

“Don’t you just love talking to me,’’ she said, laughing. “People don’t even want to talk to me at parties because this is my whole life.’’

Eight years ago, Cabral became a symbol of the New Boston, an African-American woman named the 30th sheriff of Suffolk County, heading an agency formed in a Colonial era, one that had fallen into disrepute. The department, which oversees a prison, a jail, and the delivery of court documents, was mired in scandal over the physical and sexual abuse of inmates by guards. The hiring system was rife with patronage and was being run by managers with little to no experience in corrections.

Cabral, a longtime prosecutor, overhauled the hiring system, increased training for officers, and introduced several programs aimed at helping offenders adjust to life following their release. Her jails have among the lowest suicide rates of the nation’s largest jails, according to a 2007 Department of Justice study.

She also has become a political force. Appointed in 2002 by acting Governor Jane Swift, she switched from Republican to Democrat in 2004, when she was easily elected to a six-year term. Since then, she has become one of the city’s most high-profile leaders. A compelling, passionate speaker, she often talks to neighborhood groups and has taken the stump at rallies and press conferences to push for changes in the criminal offender registry information system.

This year, she faces only nominal opposition as she seeks another term in office.

But she has come under increasing scrutiny because of the suicide of Philip Markoff, the accused Craigslist killer, in Nashua Street Jail, and after her decision to order the federal government to remove all immigrant detainees from her jails. Cabral’s confrontation with US Immigrations and Customs Enforcement followed a report from the federal agency, declaring that the Suffolk County House of Correction medical staff waited too long last year to send an ailing inmate to the hospital. The inmate, Pedro Tavarez, was facing deportation to the Dominican Republic, but died Oct. 19.

Cabral has faced her share of criticism. Early in her tenure, she was sued by employees who said she stripped them of their deputy sheriff positions because they supported her opponent, Steve Murphy. A federal court found in her favor last year.

In January 2006, a federal jury found that Cabral acted with “callous and reckless disregard’’ for the civil rights of a nurse practitioner by barring her from the House of Correction in 2003 after learning the nurse had told the FBI about an inmate’s allegation of abuse.

Prison reformers and some of Cabral’s own rank and file say they feel disconnected from the sheriff. They describe her as defensive.

Leslie Walker, executive director of Prisoners’ Legal Services, said that she admires Cabral for her positions on reentry programs and criminal records reform, but that the women butted heads last year when Walker publicly criticized the department for the way officials informed a family of a prisoner’s death.

“She is a very good sheriff on all those important topics,’’ Walker said. “But there is, like other sheriffs, this sense of, ‘I’m an island, and if you don’t like what I’m doing, what are you going to do about it?’ ’’

Matt Selig, executive director of Health Law Advocates, said his office tried multiple times between 2005 and 2007 to meet with officials at Cabral’s office, following reports from several inmates that their health care needs had been neglected.

Instead, they received letters from department officials telling them they were wrong and there would be no meeting.

“We were surprised throughout our dealings with them how unwilling they were to work with us and how defensive and almost hostile to us they were,’’ Selig said. “They don’t always make it easy for people who want to help.’’

Cabral said department officials found the inmates had received proper care and simply disagreed with the agency’s position. The sheriff denied she is dismissive of outside criticism.

“A lot of times, we will explain to people why a certain policy exists and why we have to do it this way, and their perception is, ‘Well, you should do it this way anyway,’ ’’ she said. “I think it’s very easy to be labeled thin-skinned as an elected official or a public person, because everyone expects you, no matter what is said, to simply absorb it.’’

Cabral, 50, grew up in Providence. A studious child, she read voraciously, she said, encouraged by her father, a Cape Verdean steel worker, and her mother, executive director of the East Providence Community Center.

In junior high, she found her vocation when she read “Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders.’’ Cabral said she was struck by how the book’s coauthor, prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi, convinced a jury that Charles Manson made others kill for him.

“I was fascinated by that, and the power of evidence and persuasion and argument and logic and piecing things together,’’ Cabral said.

Before she was sheriff, Cabral served as a prosecutor in Middlesex and Suffolk counties, where she was known for being well prepared and thorough. She was relentless about prosecuting repeat offenders, according to one Boston police detective who worked with her in Suffolk County.

At the same time, Cabral was not without compassion.

She recalled one incident where she recommended no jail time for an impoverished woman who had stolen several steaks from a grocery store. Cabral said she made that decision after watching a judge tell a private school student that he should not do time for selling fake driver’s licenses because he “had a real future.’’

“I knew no one was going to say that about her,’’ Cabral said.

Ralph Martin, the former Suffolk district attorney who was Cabral’s boss from 1993 to 2002, said Cabral “has got a very balanced approach. She understands that incarcerating people is the last alternative.’’

Cabral said her early years as sheriff were the toughest. She was appointed after Sheriff Richard Rouse resigned.

“The majority of people who work here just want to have a decent place to work,’’ Cabral said. “There is a small number of people who want to push back against reform and change to things that are comfortable for them. That went on for a very long time.’’

One of Cabral’s initial policy changes was to decline political donations from employees, who once made up the bulk of Rouse’s campaign contributors, drawing criticism from an independent commission that investigated his department. But her campaign this year, which has raised about $50,000, has accepted multiple donations from relatives of employees.

“I assume that if you make a contribution to me they’re doing it because they want to be supportive of the campaign and they fully understand that it doesn’t buy them any more consideration than anyone else,’’ Cabral said.

Troy Salvetti, president of AFSCME Local 419, which represents about 500 employees at the Suffolk County House of Correction, praised Cabral for lifting the department out of scandal and providing training sessions for officers to improve skills such as CPR. But, Salvetti said, many officers said they have little interaction with Cabral, who is often seen walking through city neighborhoods more than in the halls of either jail.

“We worry about being assaulted on a daily basis — having urine or feces thrown on us, being spit on,’’ Salvetti said. “We would like to see her around a little more, asking the guys how things are going.’’

Cabral said she prioritizes meeting with community leaders who can help her develop programs for inmates that will improve conditions at the jails. The visit to the Roxbury school, where she talked to a group of young City Year workers, was an example of what she says is her effort to restore public confidence in the sheriff’s office.

“When I heard that a sheriff was coming to talk, I thought she was going to be real authoritative,’’ Ashley Rose Salomon, 25, said after Cabral left. “But it was a real conversation. I see her more as a citizen, a concerned citizen, first than as a sheriff.’’

Maria Cramer can be reached at mcramer@globe.com.